Fulani Herdsmen Kill Youth Leader And Activist Solomon Aimufua In Edo State Over Grazing Of Farmland

 

The onset of herdsmen attacks was primarily due to clashes with farmers over grazing of cattle on their farmlands. Violent clashes between nomadic herders and farmers have escalated in recent years owing to climate change; population explosion, cattle rustling; political and ethnic strife. As these conflicts increase in frequency, intensity and geographical scope, so does their humanitarian and economic toll.

Thousands have been killed.

While these crises occur in different parts of the country, in recent times, Benin City Edo State has been a focal point and the nature of the attacks by herdsmen which involves the killing of farm owners in communities has been faulted by many. Herdsmen attacks in Edo State have made life insecure as people now live in fear.

On the 17th day of September 2003, Mr Solomon Aimufua was killed. He was a youth leader, and an activist who was captured on a farm and killed by the Fulani herdsmen attack in Nigeria in a community called Iguobano, in ovia South West Edo state Benin City. He fought the unlawful act of the government for allowing the Fulani herdsmen to graze on people’s farmland.  There was a calamity and clashes between the community and the herdsmen coming all the way from Northern Nigeria. 

This has been for years until 2003 where he was targeted while he was in the farm with other people. He was captured and killed. The family and the community people began to run as result of his death because they felt there was no one to represent them and speak on their behalf. 

The herdsmen have easy access to small and light weapons which encouraged anarchy in Edo North Senatorial District as armed-herdsmen, armed banditry and kidnapping has increased. The proliferation of farms in the country has jack up the Farmer-Fulani herdsmen in the area because Fulani herdsmen now move with about with AK 47 gun in this 21st century.

Whenever their cattle destroy farmland and they are query by the farmers this usually resulted to violent and crisis. They use these fire-arms to destroy lives and property at any slide provocation or argument.

In this few years this negative activities of Fulani herdsmen had increased gradualically as they kidnap for money, born down houses, villages, rape and kill people in Edo State.

In 2004, Fulani herdsmen were involved in a significant attack in Plateau State, Nigeria, resulting in the deaths of 86 people and the burning of 50 houses. This event was part of a broader pattern of herder-farmer conflicts in North-Central Nigeria.

In 2007, a notable herder-farmer conflict in Benue State, Nigeria, involved herdsmen killing 16 people in Gwer West LGA, reportedly after livestock guards were accused of stealing cattle and the herdsmen retaliated by occupying farmlands. This incident was part of a broader pattern of escalating disputes over land and resources between Fulani herders and non-Fulani farmers, particularly in the Middle Belt region since the return of democracy in 1999.

Boko Haram attacks in many parts of Nigeria also claimed many lives. The  Boko Haram insurgency began in July 2009, when the militant Islamist and jihadist rebel group Boko Haram started an armed rebellion against the government of Nigeria. The conflict is taking place within the context of long-standing issues of religious violence between Nigeria's Muslim and Christian communities, and the insurgents' ultimate aim is to establish an Islamic state in the region.

Boko Haram violent campaign has resulted in the deaths of thousands of Nigerians. The group has carried out frequent attacks and bombings, in some cases using suicide bombers.

Target locations have included police stations, military facilities, churches, schools, beer halls, newspaper offices, and the United Nations building in Abuja.

In addition, the group has assassinated Muslim clerics and traditional leaders in the north for allegedly cooperating with state authorities. Boko Haram’s increasingly sophisticated and coordinated attacks have targeted Nigeria’s ethno-religious fault lines and security agents in an attempt to wrest power from the Nigerian government and create an Islamic state governed by strict sharia.

In January 2013, Boko Haram took over control of Marte, Mobbar, Gubio, Guzamala, Abadam, Kukawa, Kala Balge, and Gamboru Ngala local government areas in northern Borno, chased out local government officials, took over government buildings and imposing its will. So critical is the threat posed by Boko Haram that in January 2012 Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan lamented, ‘The situation we have in our hands is even worse than the civil war [1967–1970] that we fought’

Nigeria Government needs to address impunity. It is unfortunate that despite the spate of attacks by herdsmen nobody has been brought to justice. It is therefore imperative to create special tribunals to investigate, prosecute offenders and compensate victims.